...and you like it

Tech-Ed 2004: Don Box and Doug Purdy talk about Connected Systems.

It's probably too early to tell, but Don
Box and Doug
Purdy gave what I bet will be the
most interesting talk I will hear at Tech-Ed. This was the opening talk
for the Connected Systems track which focuses on that hot TLA, SOA
(Service Oriented Architecture).

The implications of The Program is that we are constantly adding code to
it while it still runs, but we can't reboot it. We can take parts of it
offline and replace parts, but there are parts (and decisions) within
The Program that we may have to live with forever.

One of the big revelations they had was that "There is only one
program and it is still being written." This has pretty profound
implications when you think of it. I can attest to this statement as I
recently worked on porting Fortran code running on a microcomputer to
Fortran 90 code (big upgrade!) that was to run on a modern Intel server.
The front end was being replaced by an ASP.NET site that emulated the
console currently in use. The ASP.NET site communicates with the Fortran
via memory mapped files.

"Choice is an Illusion" Darwin is the system admin for The Program.
You can't change the program, you only have control over a small sliver
of it. Your goal is to make your neighborhood better. This addresses the
initiatives in the industry to create grand unification architectures.
The physicists are still looking for a Grand Unifying Theory, but for
software architects, it's time to give that up. We're not all going to
run on a JVM. There will be no language to rule them all. We've tried
DCOM, CORBA, etc...

In any case, this keyboard is not ergo so I'm going to have to stop
typing and let you research this one on your own. Till next time, over
and out.